SOCIOCULTURAL PRACTICES AS A FACTOR OF PHILOSOPHICAL REFLECTION ON THE HUMANITARIAN CRISIS OF THE PRESENT

Abstract

B a c k g r o u n d. This article explores sociocultural practices as a factor of philosophical reflection on the contemporary humanitarian crisis, which manifests itself in the context of war, pandemics, social fragmentation, information pressure, and ecological instability. Sociocultural practices – rituals of remembrance, volunteering, public art, digital acts of solidarity – are analyzed as a space for ethical and existential engagement with new challenges to human existence, solidarity, and dignity. They are presented as responses to collective trauma, mechanisms for constructing new forms of intersubjectivity and moral interaction, and sources of philosophical understanding of the human condition today.

M e t h o d s. The research is based on an interdisciplinary philosophical approach that integrates hermeneutics (H.-G. Gadamer), phenomenology (M. Heidegger), social philosophy (P. Bourdieu, J. Habermas), the ethics of responsibility (E. Levinas, J. Butler), and poststructuralist critique (M. Foucault, M. de Certeau). The study employs conceptual analysis of the notions of “sociocultural practice” and “humanitarian crisis,” a structural-functional approach to the analysis of cultural mechanisms of response to destruction, and hermeneutic reconstruction of public actions that embody philosophical meaning in lived experience.

R e s u l t s. Sociocultural practices emerge as mediators between individual and collective experience, between past and future, between suffering and action. They not only represent the experience of catastrophe but also create conditions for philosophical reflection on a world marked by disintegration, moral fragmentation, and identity crisis. Through such practices, a new kind of philosophical sensitivity emerges – one oriented toward historical trauma, vulnerability, and responsibility toward the Other.

C o n c l u s i o n s. Sociocultural practice plays a key role in restoring the humanistic horizon, becoming a form of philosophy-in-action. It articulates solidarity, remembrance, and dignity, opening the way for rethinking humanity in a post-catastrophic world. As such, it is not merely a strategy of adaptation to crisis but also a source of cultural renewal and ethical re-evaluation of contemporary modes of being.